Natural Snow Buildings - Shadow Kingdom Disc 2xCD / 3xLP [Blackest Rainbow] [2009]

Natural Snow Buildings is a duo from France, consisting of artists Mehdi Ameziane and Solange Gularte. They play music which can be classified as experimental psychedelic folk with drone elements and ambient influences. Formed in 1997, they released numerous albums, many of them in extremely limited quantities. Double album The Dance of the Moon and the Sun is their most popular work so far, ranked on Rate Your Music as the third best album of 2006.

Both members of Natural Snow Buildings release music also as solo artists: Mehdi Ameziane as TwinSisterMoon and Solange Gularte as Isengrind.


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Evan Caminiti - Psychic Mud Shrine [Digitalis ACE029] [2009]

ace029: evan caminiti "psychic mud shrine" CD $13
For my money, Barn Owl is the best new band to emerge in the last five years. Their trajectory has been meteoric, progressing musically and conceptually in leaps and bounds. I've been thrilled to be there from the beginning, watching and listening in awe as the duo of Jon Porras and Evan Caminiti have carved out an impressive niche of their own. Heavy doses of guitar savagery and tribal essence have them firmly planted at the top of the mountain. So it makes sense to deconstruct the duo and present each as a solo entity, soaring on their own.

In a perfect world, Evan Caminiti would be a guitar god worshipped by hordes of spike-wearing metalheads. Seriously. Caminiti's newest solo offering (and first large-scale release) is a big, smoldering mass of guitar sacrifices. We're deep down in the hollows now. "Psychic Mud Shrine" is epic in every way. Thick, massive walls of lava-flow guitars bow down at an altar of excess. Caminiti creates jagged drones like no other. Distorted guitars sound simultaneously tortured and energized like it's unsure if this hell on earth brings pleasure or pain. It's just so fucking massive. With titles like "Melting Temple/Plumes of Babylon," you know what direction this is heading and it's a train you don't want to miss.

"Psychic Mud Shrine" is a powerful statement from an artist coming into his own. Over the course of four sprawling masterpieces, you'll be entranced and exalted. This album rings out from the deep valleys carved straight to the fucking core.

Edition of 500 in gatefold jackets with all art designed by Caminiti.

tracklist:
1. frozen plains
2. melting temple/plumes of babylon (excerpt)
3. midnight's road
4. kcalb egdol

listen to "midnight's road" on this digitalis podcast HERE

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Elm - Nemcatacoa [Digitalis ACE028] [2009]

ace028: elm "nemcatacoa" CD $13


For my money, Barn Owl is the best new band to emerge in the last five years. Their trajectory has been meteoric, progressing musically and conceptually in leaps and bounds. I've been thrilled to be there from the beginning, watching and listening in awe as the duo of Jon Porras and Evan Caminiti have carved out an impressive niche of their own. Heavy doses of guitar savagery and tribal essence have them firmly planted at the top of the mountain. So it makes sense to deconstruct the duo and present each as a solo entity, soaring on their own.

Elm is the name of Porras' solo creations. His music retains the megasonics of Barn Owl, but finds his tutelage deep in the heart of the desert. "Nemcatacoa" is a lonesome, epic journey. Named after one of the deities of his Colombian heritage, his latest full-length (and first large-scale solo release) feels huge and endless. Walls of guitars shatter beneath the weight of the booming percussion blasts that find their way from the caves into the light. An acoustic guitar is mournfully plucked, the beginning of a procession of the dead. "Nemcatacoa" is an album begging for somebody, anybody to find and embrace.

Porras is a master artist. The instrumentation at work here is even more impressive when you consider it's played by a lone soul. Guitars, Rhodes, Harmonium, Trumpet and more echo through the caverns of the ancient Earth. Even though this album is dark and at times bleak, it never overpowers. Traversing similar aural planes as Sunn O))) and Earth, Porras is staking a claim all his own. As his voice wails over blankets of guitars, he never loses sight of the golden life ahead. Incredible.

Edition of 500 CDs in silver-on-black gatefold sleeves.

tracklist:
1. nemcatacoa (audio)
2. in the shadow of red rock
3. silver dust in moonlight
4. arc of wisdom
5. sacrament at dusk
6. breath of midnight still (audio)
7. covered in blankets & moss
8. three rings drawn in sand
9. mirage at the devil's playground

http://www.digitalisindustries.com/ace028.html

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Mike Tamburo and Ken Camden\Of Meisha [3'' CDR] [New American Folk Hero NAFH7]

[NAFH7] MIKE TAMBURO & KEN CAMDEN - Of Meisha 3"

Reissued, Re-edited and Remastered, this long out of print recording features Ken and Mike together in one of the most reverberant rooms imaginable. Subtle interplay and beautiful ecstatic guitar drones. A very welcome addition to the world of Meisha.

Here is one by request.

This release can be purchased at:
http://www.myspace.com/newamericanfolkhero

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Eskimo King - Tooth-Shaped Migration [CDR] [Our Mouth Records #11] [2006]

Review from Andrew Meehan on Foxy/Digitalis:
http://www.digitalisindustries.com/foxyd/reviews.php?which=1791

Though their discography is still a jungle all its own, the Mouthus duo did catch the entrepreneurial spirit that pervades absolutely through the noise community. Mouthus recently formed their own private press label, Our Mouth, to showcase the band’s latest LPs, as well as related side projects – recently Afternoon Penis and Eskimo King. Yea, this build-your-own ethic is causing quite the flood of releases, but Mouthus isn’t inclined to release every key scrape that hits the tape. So far, Our Mouth has served to treat fans to the band’s fully-baked experiments.

This summer, Brian Sullivan, the axe-wielding Shiva and circuit bender of the duo, made his first release under the moniker of Eskimo King. His first CDR, “Tooth Shaped Migration,” is a veritable short-player, not even hitting the 18 minute mark. That’s quite prudent for a dude that I’ve seen shred a guitar live for damn near a half hour. But as Eskimo King, we are treated to the echoes of a somber and contemplative mind.

Track two begins with some all too familiar grime-drone, hinting of amateurishness, but it soon develops into a transfixing psych-drawl underscored by the percussiveness of a rattling cage and Sullivan’s bleak yet empathetic chants. The following track (all tracks are untitled) is a stunning work of understatement. Rhythmic, mesmerizing, and subdued stomps sound in the background. They sound like tufts of air released by some distant explosions. And then Sullivan’s tense guitar picking enters the track; he plugs a few chords, letting the vibrations of the last note resonate before he plays another set. It’s quite a devastating track, one that I hoped would extended beyond its playing time.

And that’s one problem I had with “Tooth Shaped Migration”: the length of the tracks. Though I’m cautious to criticize an experimental guitar player for brevity, the third and fifth tracks would have benefited from some extra roominess. Still, the restraints of Eskimo King are sometimes laudable. Listen to track two, and then imagine (hating it) if it went on for another three minutes.

Track 5 raids the depths of your headspace before slowly, slowly erupting into the foreground. This is some DEEP tissue massage. Two minutes in, and you are treated to the harmonies of a mouth harp and lifting, layered hums that swirl into some soft aural pillow. Ack! Why did they have to yank it away so soon?

Five songs in, and the disc comes to an abrupt close. I guess I’ll just have to put it on repeat. 7/10
Andrew Meehan (18 September, 2006)

Tracklisting:
1. My 2nd Magnet (1:38)
2. Pinewood Derby (4:19)
3. Ran From Ice (3:18)
4. Bear, Un-Bear (4:59)
5. Take It To The Bus Line (3:08)

Buried N. Sounds gives this album 3 thumbs up!

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Tender Buttons - Tender Buttons [CDR] [Foxglove 174] [2007]

From the Digitalis/Foxglove website:
http://www.foxydigitalis.com/fg173.html

what do you get when three danes (2 girls and 1 guy) take a trip to sweden with a tape recording, a guitar, and a few other instruments? you get tender buttons. this trio features three members of the exquisite pink luminous invocation, and this one-off project is quite special.tender buttons is named after gertrude stein's impressive book of the same name, and if that wasn't enough, the lyrics are all adapted from her writing. it's a deadly combination and though this release is short, the brevity makes you want to play it over and over again. simple folk melodies complemented with mouth organ, percussion, and other random instruments, and highlighted by (mostly) female vocals. lovely indeed. 100 copies

It appears this album is still available from Digitalis/Foxglove. Support the label and these artists by picking up a copy once you hear this and it seeps into your soul!

From the Cat Box Corp website:
http://www.thecatboxcorp.dk/tenderbuttons.html

Tender Buttons was a one-off - "let's go to Sweden and make a folk record!" - and so it was... Tanja Jessen, Marie A Jensen and yours truly traveling to a litlle cabbin out in the woods with instruments, a 4-track, an old echo-unit and some poems by Gertrude Stein for inspiration. On the second day the 4-track broke, and then we moved into the wood with a mini-disc instead. A limited edition 2x3"-cdr housed in a handmade cover with lino-cut prints was the result. Later we made a track for a forthcomming compilation on BSBTA of covers of songs by David Neuer, called Anybody's Anthems: a Tribute to David Neuer's "Mr. Anybody's Anthems", and that's more or less it. The 2x3" is currently out of print, though it might still be locatable at Sound Station, but a new, criticaly revised and wisely condensed, single (5") cdr version is out on foxglove now. And as for new music...who knows? All of Tender Buttons are currently working together in Pink Luminous Invocation along other projects, but one day we might travel to Sweden again... MK

Tracklisting:
1. A Petticoat / Cold Climate (2:45)
2. A Shallow Rose
3. A Waist
4. Cranberries / It Was Black Book Took
5. A Shave
6. Instrumental
7. Nothing Elegant

Sung, played & recorded by Tender Buttons in the living room and backyard of Eriks little red house, and out in the surrounding Swedish woods, 5-9 July 2004

Marie Helgasjon - Vocals, Melodica
Tanja Helgasjon - Guitar, Backing Vocals
Marc Helgasjon - Tin Flute, Percussion, Blues Harp, Backing Vox

Absolutely haunting & beautiful forest folk. If you enjoy Fursaxa, Christina Carter, Inca Ore, etc... you will love this album - Buried N. Sounds

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Wovoka - Paiste De [CDR] [Holy Room Recordings 003] [2007]

Aquarius records review:

The return of psychedelic drugfolk alchemists Wovoka. We heavily dug their last disc, and this one is more of the same. A super tripped out, blissy drone-y raga like buzz, drifting through some Autumnal wonderland, the sky full of falling orange leaves, the ground muddy and moist, the sky a burnt copper, the wind warm and smelling of smoke and burning wood. And on the wind drifts a lazily unfurling web of skeletal acoustic guitar strum, little bits of muted guitar leads, silvery strands of banjo, lots of warm warble and tape hiss. It's not until a few tracks in that the band begins to rock, hand drums, electric guitar, some wailing psych leads, but even at their rockiest, these guys are still laid back and stoned, drifting and swaying, letting night fall on their campfire jams. Looped and cyclical, dreamlike and mesmerizing, the strummed steel strings and the sporadic bongo drums turning everything into some warped alien drum circle. You can almost envision this wandering tribe of buzz-and-strum minstrels wandering through some dark Finnish forest, where they stumble upon Avarus or Anaksimandros, who of course welcome them with open arms, for once having heard the sounds coming from the woods, they knew it must be like minded spirits. Who else but musical brethren could be making such hazy, fuzzy, dreamy, druggy forestfolk...No Neck, Sunburned, Tower Recordings, Avarus, you know you the names, add Wovoka to the list if you haven't already....

LIMITED TO 199 COPIES. Already sold out, we seem to have the very last copies. Packaged in a super thick old fashioned mini-lp stylee gatefold sleeve, with the pasted on inside image, and pressed on faux-vinyl cd-r's (complete with inside label and fake grooves!).

MPEG Stream: "Octopus Latitudes"
MPEG Stream: "Knotty Pine Rag"

Get some other Wovoka albums from the magnificent "Grown So Ugly"
Wovoka on MySpace

It appears that Aquarius still has some copies. Use the links under Mail Order to the right and go get one before these disappear forever! Highly recommended!

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